Words from the woods

Par Vilde Valerie Bjerke, Illustration Danny Larsen - 9 mn

After numerous weeks of vigorous being and doing around the clock, the cruel fierceness of summer had made life spin so fast underneath my feet that everything around me was turning into a greyish blur of suppressed anxiety, perpetual hangovers and stifling FOMO. My insides felt bruised and battered from too much socialising and too little sleep, and like a punctured balloon I was sinking slowly towards the ground.

One damp night in the middle of August, after spending an hour and a half listening to the incessant buzz buzz buzzing of my own thoughts, the high pitched whining from a distant car alarm and the snoring of my flatmate’s dog – I’d had enough. I grabbed my phone from under my pillow, squinted against the bright screen, and tapped my way to a train ticket. Destination? The realm of goats, moose and trolls – aka “Sætra”, my family’s cabin, deep in the mountains of Hedmark.

The next day I dug out my old backpack and filled it with some essentials: my notebook, a copy o...